Freshman rep gets the ‘crow’ for drawing just 8 votes for motion

Rep. Heather Scott, R-Blanchard, poses with the "crow" at her desk in the Idaho House chamber (Betsy Z. Russell)

Following today’s House vote to pass the tax conformity bill, the House went at ease for a bit of a tongue-in-cheek ceremony: The “crow,” a statue of a crow that’s ceremonially passed to the House member who gets the least support on a bill or motion, was carried from its former custodian, Rep. Mat Erpelding, D-Boise, to Rep. Heather Scott, R-Blanchard, for getting just eight votes on her motion to “lay on the table” the conformity bill, HB 425.

That’s a rarely used parliamentary maneuver that requires a majority vote to pass, then tables the bill and keeps it from being taken back up without two-thirds approval. That was the move used in committee last spring to kill the child support enforcement bill, which then led to a special session to pass an amended version.

Scott accepted the crow in good spirits, and posed for pictures with it as her fellow lawmakers snapped away with their phones.